Australia did not grant them asylum (refugee status), but we are in what has to be the dumbest refugee deal ever heard of!
This bunch of 35 (flying yesterday) will bring the number of mostly single Muslim men from Afghanistan, Pakistan and Rohingya (Burma), free to walk the streets in Any Town, USA, to nearly 200.
Do we really expect these fighting age young men to go cheerfully into meatpacking companies to do slaughterhouse work?
But, take heart! Trump’s travel ban is saving us from Iranians—BFD!
I will repeat, if just one, of what could ultimately be 1,250 of the newly minted ‘refugees,’ becomes a problem it will be on Donald Trump because he should have followed his original instincts this time last year and killed the “dumb” deal!
And, refugee contracting agencies should be shaking in their boots because just one bad apple will bring more anti-refugee headlines. Recently we learned that some were going to New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Georgia and North Carolina, here.
See all of my dumb-deal posts by clicking here.
From The Guardian:
Another 35 refugees are leaving Nauru for the United States on Sunday, the third group to depart Australia’s offshore immigration centres this week.
Almost all are single Afghan, Pakistani or Rohingya men, along with one Sri Lankan family and one Bangladeshi refugee, said Ian Rintoul of the the Refugee Action Coalition.
The makeup further confirms fears that Iranians, who make up the largest national group on Nauru, have so far been excluded from the US intake. Iran was proscribed by Donald Trump’s “travel ban”.
So far 84 people have flown from Nauru and another 85 from Papua New Guinea’s Manus Island to the US under the resettlement deal, with at least one more flight expected to leave this month.
About 2,000 refugees and asylum seekers remain in Australia’s offshore system.
The controversial “US deal” – decried as “dumb” but upheld by Trump – was brokered by his predecessor, Barack Obama, and the Australian prime minister, Malcolm Turnbull, in September 2016.
There is much more (here) including a lengthy discussion about how some of the ‘refugees’ were just walking around Manus Island, minding their own business, when they were attacked by local police.
And, of course the detainees have twitter accounts to alert the world of the abuses they supposedly suffer.
Trump is scheduled to meet with Australian Prime Minister Turnbull later this week, see here.